The Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) has praised Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for her remarks before the United Nations Human Rights Council, calling for an end to the institutional bias against Israel which has lead to it passing more resolutions against Israel than against all nations in the world combined.

The Human Rights Council, which replaced the corrupt and ineffective Human Rights Commission in 2006, is just as biased. It has an in-built automatic majority of autocracies who determine its agenda and vote. In five years, the Council’s controlling membership eliminated probes into the most serious human-rights abuses in Belarus, Congo, Cuba, Liberia and Sudan. Asian and African dictatorships also acted in tandem to minimize scrutiny of nations like Zimbabwe. Israel, however, has been the subject of some 30 Council’s resolutions, approximately 80% of all critical Council resolutions.

In her remarks to the UN Human Rights Council, Secretary Clinton said, “Sometimes, the Council does not act, and its integrity is undermined because it defers to regional relations, diplomatic niceties, and cynical politics. Membership on this Council should be earned through respect for human rights … This Council’s predecessor, the Human Rights Commission, lost its credibility in part because Libya was allowed to serve as its president. It should not take bloodshed for us to agree that such regimes have no place here. And I must add, the structural bias against Israel – including a standing agenda item for Israel, whereas all other countries are treated under a common item – is wrong. And it undermines the important work we are trying to do together. As member states, we can take this Council in a better, stronger direction … the Council must apply a single standard to all countries based on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It cannot continue to single out and devote disproportionate attention to any one country” (‘Remarks at the Human Rights Council,’ February 28, 2011).

ZOA National President Morton A. Klein said, “We strongly applaud Secretary Clinton’s forthright comments to the Human Rights Council regarding its shocking and persistent institutional bias against the Jewish state of Israel. We strongly hope that the U.S. will hold the Council accountable for its future conduct and if the Council continues in its present unacceptable and anti-Semitic actions, that it will review America’s membership of the Council.”